The Big Picture - The Steven Spielberg Rankings and ‘The Fabelmans’

Episode Date: November 23, 2022

‘The Fabelmans,’ Spielberg’s deeply personal new film, opens wide this holiday weekend. To celebrate, Joanna Robinson joins Sean and Amanda to break down the movie and rank all 35 of his films. Hosts: Sean Fennessey and Amanda Dobbins Guest: Joanna Robinson Producer: Kai Grady Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

The time has come to get ready for the 2022 World Cup. And what better way to prepare than by revisiting the World Cup's most amazing goals? I'm Brian Phillips. I'm making a podcast about the history of the Men's World Cup, told through the stories of 22 iconic goals. The show's called 22 Goals. It's out now on the Ringer Podcast Network, and we're having so much fun. Get groceries delivered across the GTA from Real Canadian Superstore with PC Express.

Shop online for super prices and super savings. Try it today and get up to $75 in PC Optimum Points. Visit superstore.ca to get started. I'm Sean Fennessy. I'm Amanda Dobbins. And this is The Big Picture, a conversation show about Steven Spielberg, the man who is perhaps the world's greatest mainstream filmmaker

has a new and deeply personal film opening wide this holiday weekend. It's called The Fablemans. To celebrate, we are breaking down the film that many consider a frontrunner for Best Picture at this year's Oscars. We're also going to rank all 35 of Steven Spielberg's feature films. Joining us to do so, returning to Spielberg conversation, the great Joanna Robinson. Hi, Jo. I'm thrilled that I am the big pick Spielberg Conversation, the great Joanna Robinson. Hi, Jo. I'm thrilled that I am the big pick Spielberg go-to. What a prize placement for me. Amanda, how you doing? I'm really stressed

because we did not discuss how we are going to do the ranking at all. Like we've done absolutely no prep. Maybe you both have done some mental prep. I guess I did a little bit, but then I got intimidated by the task. And so this is all going to happen on Mike, which, you know, both from a homework perspective and an emotional, you know, relationship health perspective, I'm a little nervous about. ranking the films of maybe the greatest director ever. And I don't know. 35 of them. I was re-listening to the Sam Raimi ranking that you did, Sean. And I was like, okay, yeah, this is just sort of, it's feels, it's vibes. It's a lot of vibes is how the group project goes.

But I ranked my own list so that I have it to like look at. But that's all I did. I think I did this. I'm certain I did this in 1987 and in 2004 and in 2011, just in my mind of like, what are my favorite Spielberg movies? But when you don't think about as much as sort of like, what is 22 to 16? You know, like there's a middle zone that I think it will be difficult for us. Nevertheless, let's talk about The Fablemans first, because this is a very big movie this year. I don't know if it's necessarily a hugely commercial film that we can talk about that, but I'll just give a little snapshot of the story for those who haven't heard of it. It follows a young man named Sammy Fableman who falls in love with movies after his parents take him to the cinema to see The Greatest Show on Earth. And the film

opens quite beautifully with a young family experiencing the power of movies together. And soon, armed with a camera, Sammy starts to make his own films at home. And his artistic mother and his engineer father observe and quarrel over the future of young Sammy and the future of their family together. And over the course of a decade, we see as Sammy grows up, his family kind of fractures. And if you know anything about Steven Spielberg's family life and his personal history, this closely resembles his story. The story was co-written by Tony Kushner, who has become a kind of aide-de-camp to the Spielberg mythology in the second half of the 21st century thus far. And I'm just going to start by saying I thought this was an absolutely beautiful movie and

I loved it. I don't have a ton of complicated nitpicking POV on it, but I'm excited to talk to the two of you guys about it because I think we all love Spielberg and feel a strong affinity towards him. But this is clearly the most autobiographical, kind of plainly autobiographical thing that he's ever made. Joanna, I'll start with you. What'd you think of this movie? Yeah, I absolutely loved it. I sort of get, you know, Spielberg critics will hit him for sentimentality. That's where he gets hit a lot of the times, right? And I think to go into this movie, you need to just give yourself over to this is, you know, a 70-something-year-old man processing his childhood. This is a COVID-borne project of sort of, I'm at home, I don't have a lot to do.

Steven Spielberg likes to stay busy, so he decided to finally tell this story. And I think, you know, I'm unsurprised. I'm excited to hear what Amanda has to say about this, but I'm really unsurprised, Sean, that you liked it because, you know, it makes us think of all these autobiographical films that we've been seeing from our great directors you know you loved Licorice Pizza last year when I give myself over to something like this which I did

the only critical brain subject that I want to apply to it is this question of like who gets to who gets to make these stories and especially in a year where a film like Bardo is being called self-indulgently autobiographical it's interesting to me to think about like who gets to make these stories but then if anyone gets to be self-indulgent i think it's steven spielberg uh towards the end of his career so i think that's an interesting line of thought for us to examine before we get into the worthiness of this as a movie did you like this movie, Amanda? I fucking love being manipulated at the movies. This rules. Of course. It is sentimental, as Joanna said, but in a way that I think is a tribute to Spielberg's career and his abilities. Also a little bit of a skeleton key for the rest of his sentimentality and his emotions. Joanna, I don't remember if you're in the Child of Divorce

Club and you don't need to share that, but you can be an honorary member for this podcast because we're going to get into it. But this movie helped me, a founding member of the Child of Divorce Club, understand why Steven Spielberg keeps making movies about divorce. You know, it helped me understand the rest of the oeuvre and understand his emotional relationship to movies, which in a lot of ways mirrors mine or underpins what he is trying to do in movies for everybody else, which I think is like a pretty fascinating

and even profound project and one that I really respond to. is trying to do in movies for everybody else, which I think is like a pretty fascinating and even profound project and one that I really respond to. So also it was just a delightful time. Sean and I got to sit next to each other. He talked to me afterwards. It was lovely. Great time at the movies. Love to have conversations with my colleagues and friends. This is an interesting story because I think it does do what you just described, Amanda. It kind of literalizes the two halves of the Spielberg storytelling brain. The fact that he is simultaneously such a powerful and sincere artistic figure, storyteller, and also that he is

the kind of chief engineer of movie magic in the last 30 or 40 years. And, you know, it feels almost absurd to think about the binary that the film creates between mother and father and the way that he pulls, you know, quite deftly 50-50 from their experience, or at least how he is remembering them and trying to recreate what they represented to him from his perspective as a child. Paul Dano plays his father in this film and Michelle Williams plays his mother. That being said, you know, as a new parent, one of the most frequent conversations that I have with my wife is, oh, that's just like what you do. Or that's just like what I do whenever my daughter does something very specific. And I think it's reasonable to tell a story this way, to say I am better understanding myself.

It certainly feels like there's a kind of therapized aspect to this too. He spent a lot of time thinking about what roles his parents' psychology played on the kind of man that he became. I loved it. I loved the fact that it was willing to be so kind of bare naked about the way that he developed as a man and as a thinker and as an artist, because you can feel him pulling specifically from the sort of balletic and neurotic strains of his mother and the very kind of controlled and focused and pragmatic aspects of his father. What do you think of that, Joanna, the way that he rendered his parental figures in this movie? Yeah, I think that internal artist versus tech wizardry instinct in Spielberg is so interesting. I was re-watching the 2017 Spielberg doc that's on HBO.

I had seen it before, but I wanted to sort of refresh my memory of the Spielberg myth. And he was talking about Jaws, like all the way back to Jaws. And he said it was technology over art every single day is what he talked about when he talked about Jaws. And just like the way in which you can look at the arc of his career and the times in which he was really leaning into the artistic side and the times when he was really leaning into the technological side. And then, of course, the platonic ideal is a marriage of both. And so to think about that, to think about the fact that Spielberg, which he has talked about in a million interviews and in that documentary, et cetera, was estranged from his father for 15 years as a result of the plot that we see unfold in this movie. And so that disconnect from that science side

or that tech side of his brain and then looking at his filmography when that reconnection happens, again, to Amanda's great point, it becomes the skeleton key of sort of like, oh, that's what was going on. And that's why you decide to veer this direction. And that's why this era of your career looks that way.

And I think that that is truly fascinating. I don't know. What do you think, Amanda? And that's why you keep putting divorce in the movies. I don't want to spoil the fablements, but there is just a pretty literal, fascinating, definitely high-level therapy reveal in this film that really happened, apparently, in real life. He told the New York Times as much. And that aspect of the movie and the honesty of it and kind of the autobiography, the real base nature of it,

to Sean's point, is new and unvarnished and really fascinating. The thing that it does that I actually really like and really responded to is that even though there is a lot of frustration and pain and and reality in this movie it with the help of tony kushner who co-wrote the screenplay like does this spielberg magic on it you know and it it does the thing of using making art and and and movies that you see so much in his other work of providing, not just like an escape, but basically like making it okay or finding a way forward with it,

which is like clearly what film has been to him. And I think what it's been to a lot of other people. And I really liked the sort of meta aspect of that and like comment on the Spielberg project, which is like still my favorite type of movie. You know, like I, as we know, I love to go to the movies to escape and like have a good time. And that like ultimately things will mostly be okay. There are obviously exceptions to that, but that Spielberg magic, like he connects the therapy dots to it. It's pretty amazing. What is so interesting to me is like in all these interviews that Spielberg is giving, he tends to shy away from that word therapy or therapeutic.

And he keeps saying cathartic instead. He's like, oh, it's not therapy. It was cathartic. And I almost wonder if he's been advised to say that on the award circuit so that it doesn't sound like a self-indulgent project. But it is. It's therapy, right? And then it becomes therapy for all of us. I'm not in the Child Divorce Club, but I'm in the child of like, maybe my parents should have been Divorce Club. And so like, you know, that's an ancillary group. So you were born between 1960 and 2010?

Yeah. We welcome you. So you were born between 1960 and 2010? Yeah. We welcome you. Thank you. I think the other thing that's kind of fascinating about it is Janusz Kaminski shot this movie as he shot many Spielberg movies. And he's well known for this kind of hazy, cloudy, kind of golden light photography that Spielberg has used over and over again over the years. And honestly, that doesn't always work for me in his movies, but this is the first pure memory movie that Spielberg has made in a while. And so it almost feels like the rendition of what's happening inside of someone's mind as they reflect back on a moment in time. And so, you know, everyone's a little bit more beautiful. Everyone's got the right line at the right time. You know, there is clearly some invention going on here here it wouldn't be a movie if it didn't have that but the way that the movie looks feels

really um in concert i think with the way that it's supposed to feel and that's not always easy to pull off especially because the movie in addition to you know looking like a memory is also just massively indebted and kind of citing clearly its influence to movie history. There are a couple of significant influences. I mentioned The Greatest Show on Earth, which ironically is widely considered one of, if not the worst best picture winner of all time. It's a Cecil B. DeMille movie about the circus. I like that movie. It's got a great Jimmy Stewart performance in it. I'm a fan of it. I agree with you about Jimmy Stewart, who plays a disgraced clown

who never takes off his makeup. But I can't say I recommend the film. I just revisited it last night. Boy, I really don't like it. But it's so great that someone like Spielberg who is, you know,

just such a sincere and kind of winsome figure when talking about the history of the movies, that that is the movie that opened his eyes to the power of filmmaking and that led him to, at a very young age, start to take his Lionel train set and film it and try to recreate a kind of unforgettable moment at the movies that he saw, a kind of train collision with a car in that movie.

I wonder if the kind of movie going public will have the same or at least a somewhat similar response to the one that I did about this movie in the way that it is sort of interwoven with Hollywood history. I think if you're not a nerd for it, I wonder how some of that will track or if it will seem even more self-indulgent. What do you think, Amanda? Well, there is one reading of this movie, which is like, hey, look how I became such a genius, which Steven Spielberg is an absolute genius. And if you care about movies or filmmaking or just even if you can relate to that feeling of like looking up at the figure out how to do all of these things and film those train sets. And then his film projects kind of escalate over the course of the film, and there are many scenes of him showing off his latest film to basically his Boy Scout troop and his assorted family members. And they're very sweet, but there's nothing cynical

or self-deprecating about those scenes. I made sense of myself through the movies, but also I was really awesome at making movies. So if you're not on board with that, I can understand how some people might be like, wow, okay, so this is just a cheers to me situation. Well, I wanted to ask you guys about that too, because one of the things that transpires in the movie that is unexplained is that it is instantly understood that the young Sammy,

aka Steven, is a natural born leader on a film set. You know, there's no anxiety or angst about running his movies. And when he makes his war film, when he makes his Western, I mean, he's like 11, 12, 13 years old. He's a very young kid, but he knows what he wants. Right. And that is the thing that all directors say that you need to do is you need to be able to answer every question. You need to be in control. You need to be not freaking out all the time. I thought that that was a fascinating self-portrait, you know, that the movie is simultaneously, it shows him in embarrassing situations and coming of age and, you know, struggling with his identity and his relationship to his parents, but he's never less than stellar at making movies. That is so fascinating.

Well, I think he's talked about how he how that's when he felt the most in control. Like to your point earlier about the train set. Ding, ding, ding, ding, ding. Yeah, the train set moment. He was terrified by that train sequence in The Greatest Show on Earth. And so then he recreated it. And by putting it in miniature in a camera, he then feels in control of it. And as a kid, like a Jewish kid growing up in an area where there weren't a lot of Jewish kids and feeling bullied and feeling ostracized and feeling not cool at all, he has talked about how making movies, being in the camera, and then like the cool kids wanted to be in his movies. And so then all of a sudden, like he was kind of cool.

And so there's that aspect to it, the control aspect. But also, he talks so much about fear. I think this is why this is such a successful movie for him, because I think it can, it has to be scary to make this movie about your child and like dig all the way into your childhood in this way. And so he's talked about how like his best films come from when he's terrified, but also that you can never show your fear ever when you're on a film set. You have to always pretend you're confident. So I wonder how much pretense there is in that natural born leader confidence that you see in those sequences. I thought Richard Brody had an interesting observation in his review of the film that I wanted to pose to you both. So Brody wrote, what Sammy learns above all is never to sacrifice one's work for family life. Relationships come and go, but what you accomplish is your own, and without it, you have nothing to offer. You are truncated, frustrated, stifled, damaged, diminished. Now, Steven Spielberg, well-known as a big family man.

He's been married for a long time to the same person. He's got a bunch of kids. He is also sort of the grandfather of Hollywood at this point. I mean, he's 75 years old and is seen as, he was seen, I think, once as a young wonderkind. And then a kind of like avuncular, like the rich uncle of Hollywood. And now he's fully in a kind of grandfatherly phase. So I'm not sure I would have thought that the takeaway from this film is that like,

the only thing that's really there for you is your art or your craft. And yet, that idea that we're just hitting on there about control and where comfort really lies, I think is also resonant in the movie. Amanda, was that your takeaway from the film? That like, ultimately it's just about what you make and everything else is not as important?

No, but my takeaway is the other side of that and is really maybe the more sentimental way to interpret it, which is just that, you know, art can save you or can help you. That it's a place where you can be safe and make things okay. And to Joanna's point, have control, which is some real therapy 101 stuff. But listen, I think this is great. I think filmmakers as talented as Steven Spielberg should not go to therapy and should just do it in cinema and then help the rest of us. No, I'm dead serious. I mean, I agree with you. He should go to therapy if it will help him. You know, who am I?

But I just, it's nice. But I think that I take the optimist view on this or, you know, just because I did feel the warmth of the film. I think for all of its tough, maybe not unflinching, but unflattering moments of various people who he's related to in the film. It's like a pretty warm, loving portrait. So I kind of take the lessons in that tone. Joanna, what about you? I mean, I think I agree with Amanda broadly. I think what's interesting when you look at the larger Spielberg filmography is that the era where he made the movies that I like the most that are at the top of my personal ranking are the eras—is that era of estrangement from his father? this questioning, this wondering. And so he was after something. And, you know, Amanda's pointed out there's all these movies like E.T., like Close Encounters,

that are about the absent dad, that are about him trying to figure out something that is hurting him. And we talk a lot about artists and how is pain necessary for great art? And then the question is, when you become, when you're on top of the world for as long as Steven Spielberg has been on top of the world, are you still capable of great art or are

you too comfortable to create great art? And like, you know, I would say this film at the end of his long career, it's not over obviously, but you know, at this point at the end of his long career is a rebuke of that question, you know, because I do think that there is great art in this film. But I think there is a moment in Steven Spielberg's life when he reconciles with his father, when he starts having, he has like seven kids. When he starts having those kids, when he exits his Peter Pan era that, you know, the accusation that was thrown at him early in his career that he was, you know, a rest of development, you know,

like that childlike wonder we loved watching the world through his childlike wonderment eyes. And then there's a time when he became, a dad became involved in his family and his marriage. And I do think maybe his work wasn't quite as good when that happened. That like, I'm not saying that's ideal, And I do think maybe his work wasn't quite as good when that happened. I'm not saying that's ideal, but I think for an artist like Steven Spielberg, some of that lack, that absence of the warmth of family was driving some of his highest highs in his artistic career.

Yeah, that's like me after I won too many movie drafts. I just got complacent. I was sitting on top of the mountain, and I thought, how can I mix it up? How can I make things interesting? I need to go to a different phase, but I'm back on top. I'm feeling good about it. Let's talk about the performances in this movie. Let's begin with Michelle Williams because she plays Mitzi. They stand in for Stephen's mother and she is a woman who was trained as a concert pianist and clearly has an artist soul and has been seemingly stifled somewhat by becoming a full-time caretaker and mother. And the tension of the film really lies in her desire to live more freely and more fully

while also navigating the complications and in some cases strictures of family life, of married life, of being with the right person. That's a huge part of this story too. We won't spoil too much about who that person is, but Michelle Williams has a tall task. I can't imagine what it would be like to be the actor on set with Steven Spielberg trying to become Steven's mother. And he clearly has a complicated relationship with this person. Amanda, what'd you think of Michelle? For the first 20 minutes, I was like, oh, this is a disaster. And then the character, I think, develops a little bit. The complexities emerge, and you also begin to understand the

project. And then I walked away thinking that she was pretty phenomenal. I'm reminded of something that James Gray, I think, told you, Sean, on the interview that you did with him, which is because he recently made a very different but an autobiographical project. And he was talking about casting his parents or people like his parents. And the idea of that when you're a child, the way that you look at your parents is different than you do as an adult. They're kind of like movie stars. They're larger than life.

They're these really giant presences who take up the frame, not just on their own, but kind of influence how you see the rest of the world. And that's clearly what the Michelle Williams character, what the Mitzi character is to him. So it ultimately did click for me. But I don't know. It's a lot.

Am I crazy in saying it's a lot? It's a big performance. But Michelle Williams does this a lot, right? Spielberg said that he cast her in this because of both Blue Valentine and Fosse-Verdon, which I think is a really interesting intersection of Michelle Williams' projects to reach for for this character and he

also said that um when he cast both her and and Paul Dano in this that he was looking for actors who had already done things that he recognized his parents and not like I'm going to find the most versatile actor but I'm going to find an actor who's who has done projects that reminded me already of my parents and that's how I'm going to cast these roles. And I think Michelle, who often does this sort of like, I mean, she's from Montana in California, and she often does this like breathy New York accent thing that I don't understand where exactly it came from. She uses it a lot. But it ends up working here and it ends up becoming more than just like caricature or an antic performance. And I think because of that, because of the sentimentality, which in this case, in this project, I'm not using as a bad word. I'm saying

it's a positive here. What do you think, Sean? I liked the performance though. I had some reservations. I think what you just said, Joanna, is something I had maybe not been able to literalize in all these years watching Michelle Williams. Every once in a while, she has a way of talking that feels very mannered and inhuman, but trying to sound like all the people I grew up around. And that is a little bit off-putting. She's playing a woman from New Jersey in this film, and she's affecting a kind of East Coast Jewish family accent. And for the most part, it kind of like, it falls away the deeper you get into the film. But I had a very similar reaction to Amanda at the outset, which is that in what should otherwise be dreamlike, there is a level of specificity in this that feels too strong.

There is a critical moment when the family goes on a camping trip in this film, where the way that he sees his mother and the way that the family experiences their mother like shifts and the film glides into like a kind of different, like a second act that is significantly different

from the first act that I think is really where the movie takes off. And it's because of her and it's because of her performance and like the place that she occupies in his memory. And so in many ways, I actually think this movie does And it's because of her performance. And like the place that she occupies in his memory. And so in many ways, I actually think this movie does not work without Michelle Williams' performance.

And you really need somebody to be the kind of centrifugal force of the drama and the tension. I think it's similar to like her appearance in Manchester by the Sea. Where I just sort of like, this performance is both too much. And I think the film really needs it at the same time. Yeah. What about Paul Dano? What is it? Jo, what's the Paul Dano

performance that Spielberg saw that made him want to be his birth? The Riddler, obviously. No, he hasn't. I haven't found that answer yet. I do have an answer

for Judd Hirsch, though. That's really fun. But like, I haven't heard that one. I'm trying to think of what I would say the Paul Dano performance that gives us like this stolid family man. I mean, the thing that Steven Spielberg's actual father did, which is, we're dancing around spoilers, so I'm not sure what to say. But basically, take responsibility for the dissolution of their marriage for 15 years in order to protect his

wife. And that's like why Steven Spielberg was estranged from him because he thought their fathers left him when in fact, you know, the plot of this movie explains sort of another story. And that is such a fascinating person. 15 years he took the blame for the end of a marriage and took his, like, was okay with his children being estranged from him. Because, you know, and in this, like, late 60 Minutes interview that I was watching with his parents, his father was saying, like, and I still love her. Like, they gave their interview side by side years and years and years and years later after all of this. And he's like, yeah, I still love her. She's delicate and needs to be protected. And that's who I am.

And I just, it's such an interesting thing because it's almost, it's Norman Rockwell, but then it's Norman Rockwell with, like, this lynchian lie underneath. You know what I mean? I don't know. Really, really tough beat for his dad. Just is kind of my takeaway, as best I can understand it. lie underneath you know what i mean i don't know really really tough beat for his dad just is is kind of my takeaway as best i can understand it the portrayal in this movie not i think paul dano is very good but you know this is a movie about his mother i think or it's dedicated to both his parents but it's a tribute to his mother and paul dano doesn't get as much to do and to

joe's point does kind of have to take he doesn't the character doesn't get as much to do. And to Joe's point, does kind of have to take... He doesn't... The character doesn't get the fun parts and does take the blame to some degree or takes the consequences, I guess. I don't know. I still have some logistics questions about Steven Spielberg's real life and inspirations and a timeline, but we can save that for a different podcast. The reason that I asked about what the performance could have been is that I don't know that Paul Dano has ever given a performance quite like this, which I think is actually very, very good. But you're right, Amanda, that he doesn't have as much to do. He's not the fulcrum of tension in the story, really. Like he's the person who's kind of like along for the ride or kind of

having to explain practical matters consistently to his family. And, you know, he's kind of like along for the ride or kind of having to explain practical matters consistently to his family. And, you know, he's sort of the engineer of things, but he also feels a little bit like depowered at times. But, you know, Paul Dano plays, you know, crazy people. Like that's what he does. Like there will be blood and the Riddler and Swiss Army Man and Love and Mercy and 12 Years a Slave.

Like his best known performances are for people who are kind of like unhinged or they're these very delicate damaged souls or they are people who are accused of murder like you know and the thing I think is notable and I wonder if this is what really alighted Spielberg to Dano is an interesting

double feature with this film would be the film Wildlife which was Dano's directorial debut which is also about a sensitive boy and his complicated relationship to his mother and his parents who are experiencing a kind of fracturing. And, you know, Wildlife is a subtler film and definitely less sentimental than this movie is, but they have a lot in common. And I wonder if he saw something in that that maybe he felt like Dano understood what he could do in this environment.

I like him a lot. I also really liked Gabriel LaBelle, who plays the older version of the Spielberg character of Sammy. The film, at a certain point, transitions pretty intensely from a pure family drama where much of the action takes place in the home into a kind of coming-of-age high school dramedy. And I will say, when that first started, I was like, this is not working for me at all. This is like way too American graffiti for me. And then by the time we got to the conclusion of effectively the third act,

I completely understood why he wanted to do it. And it started to dovetail more with the point you were making earlier, Joanna, about the way that he could use his position as the kind of orchestrator of story as a high school filmmaker and the way that that clearly portends where his career is going.

What did you all think about the sort of high school-ness of this movie? Well, can we talk about Chloe East, who is the actress who plays his high school paramour of sorts, Monica. Just an absolutely scene-stealing, movie-stealing performance. Which, to me, when you said, Sean, that it turns from like, I'm not sure about this section of the movie to like, I totally get it.

It's 100% because of her. It's when she shows up. Yeah, she's hilarious and, you know, unlocks like a different key of what the Sammy character is looking for and how he sees like movies and who he's trying to be in the world and also brings a huge amount of humor. So credit to her. She was fantastic. I turned to Amanda Joanna after the movie ended and I said,

this is why I married my high school girlfriend. When we were talking about the Monica character. That's so sweet. Your high school love has a real power over you. There's something there. Judd Hirsch plays a really significant role in this film. He has a scene that I think is less than eight minutes long, but there is quite a bit of Oscar buzz in Best Supporting Actor.

He's, of course, been nominated in the past. We shouldn't spoil that scene, but I think we should maybe give some context to it. Joanna, what did you think of it? First of all, before you ask, Judd Hirsch himself from the stage of TIFF was like, I don't know why Steven Spielberg cast me in this movie. And Steven said Independence Day. So you're looking for the Judd Hirsch performance that unlocks this movie. Really beautiful. It's Judd Hirsch in Independence Day. So you're looking for the Judd Hirsch performance that unlocks this movie. Really beautiful. It's Judd Hirsch and Independence Day. This again, like there are so many moments in this

movie that shouldn't work, right? That you're like, is this too much? And then, so how do all those movies, how do all those moments settle back down into a movie that almost feels like conventionally sentimental when you have these bigger swing moments like the Judd Hirsch sequence. I don't know. What do you think, Amanda? That's a good question. I think some of it is just the benefit of the doubt, right? And which also Spielberg has earned and can like pay out, right? That you just kind of go on the ride because there were many moments in this where, whether it's Michelle Williams' performance or suddenly we're recreating Happy Days or whatever. And I'm just like, everyone's like, okay, now we're doing this. And every time it works out,

right? And I guess that some of that is just craft and ability, Spielberg's ability. And some of that is just how we respond to it. I don't think, you know, obviously it's a deeply autobiographical film. So no one but Steven Spielberg could make this movie. But also no one but Steven Spielberg could get people to go like on this emotional ride, which is really kind of what it is. It's like, you know, an emotional theme park of sorts. No one else could really do it in the same way. Let's talk a little bit about the Academy Awards. You know, Amanda and I have been soft pedaling this season a little bit because we still have four full months to go before the show airs.

Joanna, you were my partner in prognostication after Amanda went on leave earlier this year. Yeah. I'll start with you. I mentioned that I think this is still the front runner for Best Picture, plainly. Will it win? I think, okay, you're asking me yes or no,

and I'm not going to give you a yes or no, but like... Come on. This is a podcast. I think it depends entirely on how commercially successful this is. I think if a lot of people see this and people are talking about it, then yes, no question. But if this has a small opening the way that, like, frankly, West Side Story did, then perhaps not.

But what is true, what I think is wild, honestly, is that Steven Spielberg wants that Oscar. Like, he put this film into competition at TIFF. It's the first time he's ever put a film into competition at any film festival ever. Won the Audience Award. That's always a good move, you know, for a film, right? He's out there giving the A.O. Scott and New York Times profile, the Terry Gross Fresh Air interview. Like, there's already been so many panels and Q&AsAs and it's November that he is given for this film. It's weird that it, it's a little odd that it's a Thanksgiving open because often Spielberg opens his movies in Christmas.

Christmas. So I'm interested that this is like. Christmas is too late to win an Oscar these days. I know, exactly. So again, I think it's just all very, like, and I'm fascinated by that because I'm like, you know, you go back and watch one of my favorite YouTube clips to ever watch is Steven Spielberg reacting to not getting the Best Director nomination for Jaws. Someone was filming him that day. It's such a good, it's on YouTube. It's like three and a half minutes thereabouts. And so he talks like, Jaws gets nominated for Best Picture. It only gets four

nominations overall. And he gives this little like rant about commercial backlash. He's like, this is commercial backlash. They want you to be successful, but not too successful and all this sort of stuff. And then he spent years chasing the Oscar, right? With like Empire of the Sun and Color Purple and all this stuff. And then obviously he's had his Oscar. So what is it now that he's like, i want another one or i want it for this project like i'm very curious about that what do you think uh i mean to me it's very clear it's like

validate my entire life by giving me the academy award for the story of my life um which i frankly don't blame him for uh amanda just we haven't seen everything but we're getting real close we're almost there there's only a couple of big outstanding titles. Based on everything that you've seen, based on what you know about what's going on here, is this going to win Best Picture? Based on what I know, what I know is nothing. Like, the Oscars are just absolutely out of control at this point.

In September, I think I said to you point blank, like, oh, it'll be Fablements. Like, Fablements will just win the Oscar. There will be a lot of brouhaha and a lot of like bad vibes in an oscar season as they always are it seems and then people will vote for like the feel-good movie about the importance of cinema um so top gun maverick well yeah so that's the thing because i agree agree with Joanna that the only thing that can really stand in its way is like soft box office. And it's only in limited release right now when we're recording this, but I don't know how it'll do over Thanksgiving. And we don't know how many people will see it.

It hasn't been like gangbusters so far. So I think I would still vote yes. I mean, what else do you think could dethrone it, Joanna? I don't think there's anything else that feels strong enough to counter it. I don't see a strong enough counter-narrative is the thing that Fableman's has in his favor. I think what is interesting is what will end up happening in this long four-month lead-up to The Oscars. We're going to have to reconcile the conversations that we had around Coda last year with the Fableman's this year. Because Coda is also a sentimental movie about a family,

obviously made with less technical proficiency than a Spielberg film. But we had so many debates last year about, is this a story worthy of an Oscar? And then to have a story that's close but not close to it this year, but it's made by Spielberg. So this time we're like, well, yes, it should have the Oscar. I don't know. I'm still, I have four months to completely form my opinion around that question. Joe, where are you on Top Gun Maverick? I just haven't gotten to ask you that. Oh, love, adore, thrilled to see it possibly be nominated for Best Picture. should it win best picture i don't think so but i definitely want it nominated for sure i think you're both right

that it's hard to identify another film that could or should win who you know depending on how you feel about this sort of thing the films that it's likely competing with at this point i think maverick is in competition i don't think it's a threat to win at the moment, though the narrative is going to develop as we get into 2023. Banshees of Indischarren seems to be firmly running at number two, which is a film that has also not been hugely commercially successful. It is also quite sad and has a kind of melancholy that doesn't usually come through at the end of an Academy Awards. Beyond that, it's sort of, you know, it's everything everywhere at once. Women talking, Tar, the whale, she said,

maybe Avatar, the way of water. It's not, you know, Elvis, the woman king. It doesn't seem like there are a ton of serious contenders. That being said, in the last seven or eight years, the film that you would have identified as the front runner or the film most likely to win in November almost never won. We have had basically surprise with the exception of Nomadland most years. So I'm a little reluctant to put all my chips on the Fable Mints at the moment. Yeah, and you're waiting for the spoiler from advanced reviews. It's not going to be

Babylon, that that was something that people were thinking about. This is a year of multiple Oscar contenders that are about making movies. The love letter to the movies. You know, a thing that the Academy historically has liked. I would agree with you, Sean, we're not for that audience award win

at TIFF, which is also such a strong bellwether. You know what I mean, historically has liked. I would agree with you, Sean, were it not for that audience award win at TIFF, which is also such a strong bellwether. You know what I mean? So again, it's too early to know and no one will remember the predictions we make on this podcast. But I think if Fabelman's just does decently at the box office, it's gonna win.

That's what I think. I think this conversation has convinced me that it's not gonna win because we are all fairly confident in it and we're like well what else will go and as you both have pointed out correctly that is just like you know there's four months of of nuttery ahead so because it makes so much sense it's probably not gonna win so he's got two best director wins i could definitely see a world he's got two best director wins. I could definitely see a world in which he wins best director and not best picture in this case. Because of the admiration for him and also putting him in league with, not to spoil something significant in the film, but a handful of other people.

Sort of his icons, his heroes that play a significant part in this story. There are not very many people that have three Academy Awards, fewer directors still. He's so powerful at this point that like, if he wanted to, you know, use his political push, which it feels like he does want to use this year, I just don't see who stops him, you know? You make him sound like Mussolini or something. Yeah. He's been out there as his advocate for movies in the theater, all this sort of stuff that we want to be talking about as lovers of cinema. He is, as you say, this avuncular figure in Hollywood and has been for so long. The trains will run on time and Spielberg will win the

director Oscar. Is Michelle Williams, should she be nominated for Best Actress or is that category fraud? I understand that category fraud is like a crucial part of awards discourse every year, but like I can't get that mad about it. Of course, she's the best actress. Like you want her in supporting, the movie hinges around her. She's in more than half of it. It's fine by me. I feel like wives and mother roles or even like disregarding screen time are often dropped in the supporting category. And like the category fraud usually works the other direction where a woman who is clearly the lead of a film drops into the supporting because it seems like an easier race to win. And so I kind of admire that Michelle's like, I'm going to go for the tougher win here

and go up against like Cate Blanchett, et cetera, whoever else is in that category this year. And so, no, I don't think it's category. Why do you think it's category fraud, Sean? I mean, this is the story of Sammy Fableman. You know, this is not the story of Mitzi Fableman. I think she is, of course, perhaps the signature figure in his life, certainly his young life, but she's just not a lead. There are long stretches of the film in which she does not appear. run her in a category up against Cate Blanchett and Michelle Yeoh and Daniel Deadweiler and Viola Davis and Olivia Coleman,

people who are very clearly giving lead performances in films that you could very clearly, you could see any one of those people winning this year. I think Cate Blanchett is the person to be right now, although there will also be a big swell for Michelle Yeoh. It's interesting. I'm not like offended by it, but there was a little bit of faux outrage when it was announced that she would

be running in this category. I think I could hear a case either way. I really don't care enough to get mad about it. I just don't understand faux or otherwise outrage about trying to be more ambitious. The fraud the other direction, where you're taking a clear lead performance and putting it in a supporting category,

that I think is kind of shady. You know what I mean? Because you're going up against someone who has 10 to 15 minutes of screen time and you have the whole movie to show off what you can do. So to see the reverse it bothers me way less.

She's been nominated four times now Michelle Williams and never won. And so I think part of the kind of outrage was around the awards industrial complex

saying like we want her to win one and if she runs in supporting she'll probably win and now she may not win by running in lead. But again that's Michelle Williams' problem and not ours on the show.

Fablemans, you guys would recommend it? Yes. Yeah. Go see it. I hope it makes $100 million. It's fucking good. Steven Spielberg, he rocks. Let's rank all these movies.

I have no idea how we're going to do this, but I like, Joanna, that you have a concept in your mind. So I want to start with this. And I'm sure Amanda, you have a POV on it as well. What's the worst Steven Spielberg movie? What's the one movie where you're just like, absolutely not.

Ready Player One. Oh, what? Wow. Really? Yeah. Oh, this is going to be so hard.

I hate that movie. Oh my goodness. Did Amanda, did you ever end up seeing that movie? No, on principle, I never saw that movie. So I'm willing to stand with Joanna. I can throw one in the mix though. Okay. Despite the great horse acting, War Horse.

Yeah, War Horse is down at the bottom too. And I'm really, I'm doing that one for my dad. My dad has been mad for a decade about the film War Horse. Just didn't enjoy it. So I'll put that up there. Can we just split the difference in this era and just put the BFG at 35? Like, did we need something? Did we need the BFG?

Jo, are you a secret BFG defender? No, not at all. There's a whole cluster of movies right around there where I'm just like, to the bottom of the list you go. Okay. What if we went bfg ready player one warhorse in that order I love it I sure that's fine with me are you offended that warhorse ends up at 33 Amanda my my dad's gonna be but that's fine um okay let's let's start we'll go bfg ready player one warhorse now we go to 32 crystal skull is sitting right there

oh wow maybe crystal skull should crystal skull be 35 i feel like probably no you don't think so no there's parts of that movie that are good it's just not good overall didn Didn't work. Wish you well, Crystal Skull. This was a grim time for him. So, okay, Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull will go to 32.

Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. All right. 1941, a famously hated Spielberg film. I'm not a fan. It's, of course, the film that came on the heels

of the massive success of Jaws and Close Encounters of the Third Kind. You followed it up with a World War II comedy, a mega-sized comedy. Comedy, yeah. Not a fan, even though movies like this film were quite popular at this time. This is the time of Airplane and the Zazz Brothers

and that rise. And yet Spielberg tried to wedge himself into it and it just didn't click. Not well known for his humor in his films, Steven Spielberg. I love this section of the Spielberg doc where he's talking about 1941 and he's like, I think I'm a funny guy. I like laughing at the movies. I thought I could make a comedy. I couldn't. And I was like, okay. That's funny. Okay, so then let's say 1941 at 31.

Okay. I would like to submit Always at number 30. Okay, I like Always, but you like Ready Player One, so I don't feel strongly enough about Always. I really don't have any memory of this, so I know I've seen it at some point, but I didn't revisit it. I'm just a Dreyfus person.

I don't know what to tell you. It's a kind of supernatural fable love triangle movie. Oh, yeah. No, thanks. And it's Richard Dreyfuss and Holly Hunter and John Goodman on paper

magic Audrey Hepburn is in this movie Audrey Hepburn Audrey Hepburn sequences in this movie are not good Joanna not because she's not good

but it's like you know this heavenly creature that I didn't have it high on my list I'm just saying Richard Dreyfuss and holly i think it

gets more shit than it deserves but i am not there are other hills i want to die on today and it's not the always hill so put it put it where you want it what's a hill you want to die on for numbers 29 either tintin or bridge of spies, no to Bridge of Spies. Bridge of Spies. Absolutely not, Joanna. What's wrong with you? No way. Tin Tin is then? You know, I was just talking with my wife about Tin Tin because our pediatrician, the artwork in their offices,

and maybe I'm giving away which pediatrician's office I go to. In our pediatrician's office, there are all manner of air j illustrations of Tin Tin. That's a fancy pediatrician's office. I love the idea that a Sean Fantasy obsessive is now going to go to all the pediatrician's office i love the idea that sean fantasy obsessive is now going to go to all the pediatricians office so they can make sure they go ours is disney only i mean i i have nothing against disney um but it made me think do we need to be exposing our daughter to to tintin more and i don't i don't know i'm not i'm

not a big fan of that film either so we'll go how about tintin 29 i feel like we maybe have overlooked the terminal in the bottom rung. I was waiting. Any terminal defenders here? It's the bottom section for me. Again, there's this whole chunk of time where I'm like, Stephen, what are you doing? Are we sure that

War Horse is worse than the terminal? I really didn't like War Horse. Is War Horse down there just for Amanda's dad? I came here with a point of view, and this is my point of view. Okay, we'll do 10-10 at 29. At 28, we're going to go with The Terminal.

I think this is actually now where it gets really hard. I have a lot of love and respect for most of these films. I think probably The Post comes next. That would be my gut. Wow. So you guys really like The Bridge of Spies. Is Bridge of Spies a high on your list? I think it's not. I like it. It's not in the

bottom quartile. Okay. It's probably in the second quartile. What do you think of that? The Post, sure. I'm happy to put that there. Okay. It's a little rude but okay. Is it? To whom? The caftan that Meryl streep wears in that film to meryl streep to tom hanks i mean i love democracy not dying in darkness

all true things um i respect everything about what you just said but maybe and i like that movie i'm just you know it's kind of et amanda what are we talking about listen movie. I'm just, you know, I made E.T., Amanda. What are we talking about? Listen, I know. I'm just saying. What about Duel, which I don't think belongs at the bottom. It is very early, integral to his success, but I don't think it belongs

high on the list. I agree. I think 26 for Duel feels like the right place. Yeah. Which is an acknowledgement of its achievement as a TV movie. You know what's tricky?

I don't really know how to adjudicate this because I went back and rewatched some of the really early Spielberg stuff, most of which I had never seen before, but because of the wonders of the internet are now widely available. Spielberg, I'm sure listeners of the show know, got his start in television. And in fact, the film, The Fablemans, kind of tips towards that at a certain point

as he thinks about the future of his career. And he directed one of the first episodes ever of Columbo. He directed episodes of the show, The Rod Serling Show Night Gallery, and he directed a bunch of TV movies. Duel is the one that is most often cited, but he directed a bunch of other stuff, including a TV film called Something Evil and also a TV film called Savage. I think in that case, both of those films were originally television pilots, so they don't get lumped in with Duel, whereas Duel was just meant

to be a standalone story about a man who is effectively being menaced by a truck driver. And it's this very kind of tense thriller that aired, I think it was on ABC. I'm not quite sure which network. But he's done a lot of other stuff. The Columbo episode, for example,

you can just watch that right now on Peacock and it looks great. And it's a great episode of Columbo. I think it's the second episode ever of Columbo. And Columbo rocks for those of you who are not familiar with that show starring Peter Falk. Joan Crawford is one of the first actors he ever directed. Joan Crawford. And it's good.

Like, yeah. Okay. Can I just share what Steven Spielberg has said about Duel, which is, uh, Duel is my life in the schoolyard. The truck was my bully.

The car was me. I'm just like, oh, Steven. Yeah. That's so sad. Can I share one little anecdote about Joan Crawford and Steven Spielberg? Please. Absolutely. When I wrote about Spielberg around the release of that documentary, Joe, that you were citing earlier, I used that as kind of like an entry point into Spielberg's career. And Spielberg said directing Joan Crawford was like pitching to Hank Aaron

your first time in the game. And then here's what Joan Crawford said about Spielberg. When I began to work with Steven, I understood everything. It was immediately obvious to me and probably everyone else that here was a young genius. I thought maybe more experience was important, but then I thought of all those experienced directors who didn't have Steven's intuitive inspiration and who just kept repeating the same old routine performances. That was called quote-unquote experience. She went on to say many other nice things about Spielberg. I think Spielberg was 22 when he directed Joan Crawford in Night Gallery. So in a way, the self-mythology of the Fablemans is true.

I was going to say that earlier. Like, his whole thing starts with myth, right? The story of him sneaking onto the Universal lot and just setting up an office for himself. The fact that, yeah, he was put under contract at the age of 20, I think, at Universal. And then, like, in that documentary, a bunch of his colleagues were like, I'm not sure any of that's true. But that's the myth of Steven Spielberg as he started, that he snuck onto set to watch Hitchcock direct before Hitchcock kicked him out. Like it all starts with this, from the very beginning of his career, it's been a myth in Hollywood, which is interesting. I included the Twilight Zone segment, Kick the Can, speaking of Rod Serling, in the list of films here. That's obviously only one-third or I guess even one-quarter of the Twilight Zone

movie, which is an entire podcast unto itself that maybe we'll talk about one day. But I feel like 25 is a safe place to put this. This film doesn't happen without Steven Spielberg's participation as well, and I think him kind of curating in part George Miller and John Landis and Joe Dante as

the filmmakers behind that quartet of modernized Twilight Zone stories. He's really the guy who made it happen. And we haven't even talked about Spielberg as a producer and a mocker and a visionary of Hollywood, but he also had great taste and he's hired great people and he's produced great projects over the years. So I see this entry as a kind of stand-in for a lot of that work. Are you guys cool with that at 25? Yeah. Yeah. Okay.

Thanks for saying, yeah, this is a audio medium that we're doing here. So not just nodding. Joanna is now the time to ask how you feel about hook. Great question. Oh, I have hook.

Very high. Are you one of those? Yeah. I was a little nervous. And so I was like, Oh, maybe we should ask about this now and get it out in the open. Okay.

All right. So you're one of those people. I am one of those. That's okay. There's room for everyone. But I'm happy to negotiate it to the middle. Do you know what I mean? Yeah.

Okay. Do you think your appreciation for it is sentimental pablum? Or do you think it's genuinely great? I say that as somebody who loves sentimental pablum and traffics in nostalgia, so I'm not indicting you by saying that. No, it's hugely nostalgic because I was the exact bullseye right age

when Hook came out. It was huge. Like, Robin Williams could do no wrong. Bangerang became like a thing that we would talk about, Rufio, et cetera. Like, that's all in there. But then rewatching it and rewatching it and then thinking about that skeleton key comment that Amanda made, where you think about

the never growing up aspect of Spielberg, the absentee dad aspect of Spielberg, all that stuff. I think there is important stuff in there in a very, like a silly shell. Julia Roberts is terrible in that movie, for example. You know, like there's, there's parts of that movie that are not great, but I think Hoffman's great, you know, like I think that there's great stuff in there too. So, so there's a couple of contenders,

I think for where we're at at this stage, I think Sugarland Express is up there, which is his first proper feature film, Goldie Hawn kind of a criminals on the run movie that is entertaining. And I think indicates a direction that his career is going to go in but you know it's it's hard to stand up to whatever is happening in the in the top half of these films you know I think the color purple is pretty flawed as as his films go I think there is certainly beauty in it and some very very good performances but Joanna as you noted it is kind

of desperately seeking attention for its maturity and its weightiness of theme. And I think Spielberg has said, you know, since it was made, that he was not the right person to make that movie. And if it were 2022, he wouldn't be adapting that novel. So I think that's in contention.

And I also just think the Lost World Jurassic Park, like, isn't great. I was waiting. I was going to suggest Lost World at this point. We might have gone too far before putting Lost World in there, but let's just slot the Lost World at 25 then.

Or 24, rather. Because it does have some very cool action set pieces, and it does have a kind of briskness that I think is a little bit underrated. But it also feels deeply unnecessary. One of the few pure cash grabs of his career. I don't know what else he felt he had to say about making a movie about dinosaurs that he didn't accomplish in the first film. I mean, I don't think Ready Player One is a cash grab. Ready Player One just feels so emotionally bankrupt to me.

But we already placed it. But I'm just saying. Well, here's what I'll say. Perhaps this is in defense of someone who I will never meet and doesn't care about me. But at least the case in that one was he was working with new technology the same way that he was working with new technology in Jurassic Park and in previous other films in E.T. Tintin, yeah. Tintin as well. Part of his kind of like innovator story.

Whereas with The Lost World, I literally don't know what did he get out of that creatively. Imagine not much. So I don't have a problem putting that at 24. Color Purple, Color Purple, 23. Color Purple, and then Sugar Land. And then Sugar Land. I think that's right. I'm inclined to go Hook after that. Is that crazy? That's kind of where I

am. Joanne, are you fighting for a top 20 placement for Hook? Okay. I'll give you Bridge of a top 20 placement for Hook? Okay. I'll give you Bridge of Spies at 21 and Hook at 20. What? No. Oh, my God. If we're going to do a Spirit of Compromise and whatever, I'll do Hook at 21 and Bridge of Spies at 20.

Okay, sold. Sold. Bangerang. Got it. That's a very high placement for Hook, is where my head's at. But that's okay. But the thing is, I think people are really split on that movie. Aren't they?

Are they not? It's not like a weird little minority that loves Hook. It's a larger minority that loves Hook. All right, do you guys want to do your... I know we're not going to put weird Spielberg this low, but like this is when Amanda's like, okay,

let's do weird Spielberg and get it out of the way. So would you now like to defend, or I guess weird Tom Cruise in the case of minority report? No, that's going way higher. I love minority report.

That's going way higher. No, there's still more. What about War of the Worlds if you want to put a Tom Cruise? No, that's going way higher. No, absolutely not. Oh my gosh, Sean, are you serious?

No, both of you, stop it. Please. We haven't put Amistad on this list yet, so Amistad goes next. Okay, I'm fine with Amistad at 19. Amistad is a great place to put Amistad. What about Temple of Doom? I think right after Amistad. I'm fine with that as well.

Now we're into nut-cutting time. Apologies for that phrase, but it is accurate here as we get into the top half. The final 17. We have 17 more movies to rank here, guys. What about AI, which isn't wholly his film anyway? And I like it more than a lot of people do.

Absolutely not. Are you serious? Where are you guys talking about? Make a counter proposal. Make a counter proposal. Where are you going to put everything? You can't put everything in the top five. Let me take a look at this list. Here are the films that are remaining.

I'm just going to list them for the... Let's ground the listener, okay? In chronological order, here's what's remaining. Jaws, Close Encounters of the Third Kind, Raiders of the Lost Ark, E.T. Those movies are good. Empire of the Sun. I love that movie.

Jurassic Park Schindler's List Saving Private Ryan A.I. Minority Report Catch Me If You Can War of the Worlds Munich

Lincoln West Side Story and The Fablemans. You forgot Last Crusade. Yeah. Oh, I'm sorry. And The Last Crusade. I apologize.

So, I would say I think we need to find a way to bunch War of the worlds lincoln and probably west side story in this space it's funny because like my list right now reads war of the worlds lincoln ai empire of the sun like that's where i am in my list right now i guess i could probably get okay with that but then i'm gonna bully you guys at the end i'm okay with that i'm not an empire of the bully you guys at the end. I'm okay with that. I'm not an Empire of the Sun person.

That's a big Chris Ryan movie. I know, but he spoke about it so beautifully on the 1987 movie draft that now I feel like I need to advocate for it on Chris's behalf. I love that movie. It's not that it's not an accomplishment. It is an accomplishment. But I don't know. You said War of the Worlds at 17.

Lincoln at 16. AI. AI at 15. Empire of the Sun at 14. Yeah. So West Side Story is higher than Lincoln? Oh, no, it shouldn't be. Yeah.

No, no. I would put West Side Story where you proposed Lincoln. Okay. 16 and then Lincoln at 15? Just shift everything down. It's like War of the Worlds, West Side Story, Lincoln, AI, Empire of the Sun. I think that's right. I think Last Crusade is going underneath that.

What do you think about that? So we're two Last Crusades heads here. So you're, yeah, we're aligned on that. Yes. So that's going to be a tough situation for you. Okay, Fableman's next. Where does the Fableman's fall in this conversation? Have we gone too far?

Is the Fableman's not number 12 on his career list? 12 actually might be okay. Yeah, I'm super fine with Fableman's here. I think I'm more likely to rewatch. Well, I'm definitely more likely to rewatch AI than the Fableman's. This is tough for me, guys. Okay, well, you're just going to have to sit with that. AI is about the beauty of all life.

Yeah, I know. I was assigned it in a college class and I refused to go. What an amazing professor you must have had. How dare you disrespect that person? It was our summer term. And so it was like one of the like gut courses that you had to take to graduate.

And everybody just took like, you know, like a joke robotics course during the summer term, which was like really a party term. And then they just assigned us to go to the movies and I was like, no, thanks. I'm not going to be seeing that. A great education that I got. This is too high for Munich. I agree with that. Munich is next on my list, but I'm happy to put it lower. Munich is not 11.

Munich's not 11. Where is it? Can we just swap Lincoln and Munich? Or AI and Munich? We can swap Lincoln and Munich. Lincoln, yeah. Why are you guys hating on... Yo, the AI heads are going to come for you. And also the AI is going to come for you.

Right. AI isn't really his movie, is the thing. It's a five-star film. If you're making a... No, it's not a five-star film, first of all. And second of all, it's like he's babysitting something're making no it's not a five star film first of all and second of all yes it is you know and it's like

he's babysitting something like it's not all art is adaptation okay okay now I'm looking at Lincoln at 11 and I'm like

is that too high I do like Lincoln quite a bit vacillate between being bored by Lincoln and being inspired by Lincoln so I can't believe

you were dumping on Bridge of Spies Joe that was painful sorry you brokered decently. I appreciate you letting us put it at 20, but the Cone brothers wrote that.

Come on, man. You don't give a damn. Listen, the union of Mark Rylance and Steven Spielberg is an unholy union, I think. Wow. But I think that's reflected on this list because BFG and Ready Player One are down at the bottom. Yeah, I guess that's

true. Okay, so just to recap what we've recently done, we moved Munich to 15, AI is currently 14, Empire of the Sun is 13, The Fablemans is 12, Lincoln is 11, and now we have the top 10. This is hard. One of the hardest things we'll ever do here on this podcast. We did our top fives when we talked about West Side Story. I don't even remember what my top five was. I know the movies of his that I love the most. Again, if I were making this by myself,

Last Crusade would be at number 10. So you guys, can you really put two Indiana Jones movies in the top five? This is where I could put Minority Report, Amanda.

Yeah. But I, and I would vote for that, but I would accept Last Crusade at 10 and Minority Report at 9. I'm not going to fight for number one. Are you kidding me? But like, there's miles to go. You take Crusade over Raiders? Yeah. I mean, I prefer Crusade over Raiders. That was the conversation we had on the West Side Story podcast when Amanda and I came down.

So not to like tip my hand too much, but Joe, I just need you to know that I am going to accept Raiders over Last Crusade. Yes. For just in terms of like a historical document as like a record. Totally. It's like the one. Okay. Yeah. Raiders in the top five,

but I would put Last Crusade like six. Wow. I love the boldness. Okay. There are a lot of Last Crusade lovers. I don't think that

that's like a radical take. I think Minority Report at 10 is fair. Let's do that. Let's put Minority Report at 10, even though it is a personal favorite, a movie that I think is like one of his most purely entertaining movies. Okay, so maybe we'll give you Last Crusade at eight,

and then we have to find something for nine. I would do Catch Me If You Can at nine. I think that's right. I love it. It's sort of like under, nine is like underrating it, but it's also accurate given everything else on this list in terms of both like technical achievement and historical importance.

I think that what's true about both Minority Report and Casualty of a Can, which I often put in my like top five, I think I did put it in my top five when we did West Side Story, is that they're underloved and so I always feel like

I need to fight for them. But if I'm being really honest and looking at the rest of the movies that we have to go, then I can't put them up higher in good conscience. So just to refresh, here's what our top fives were when we did this episode. Joanna, Minority Report was number five. Close Encounters was number four. Catch Me If You Can was three.

Last Crusade was two. Jurassic Park was one. Amanda, your top five. Catch Me If You Can at number five. Last Crusade at four. E.T. at three. Jaws at two, Jurassic Park was one. Amanda, your top five, catch me if you can at number five, Last Crusade at four, E.T. at three, Jaws at two, Jurassic Park at one. My top five, Minority Report at five, Raiders of the Lost Ark at four, Jurassic Park at three, A.I. at two, two, Jaws at one. Well, so one thing I'll just say is that those lists were expressions of personal taste.

They were. And also, like, maybe even a little bit like favorites to Joe's point of like, you know, some are underrated or some we don't get to talk about as much. And so. As opposed to the government funded work we do here at The Big Picture, which is. Right. Which will be enshrined. Part of the historical record. Yeah.

It'll go in the Library of Congress. And like, I mean, so Jaws wasn't on my top five because I knew you guys were going to talk about Jaws. And so I didn't put Jaws on my top five list. But it's number two on my list here because I understand its cultural significance. So I do think that I'm thinking about this list a little differently. I think, Amanda, you're right. Which is to say, let's do Minority Report at 10. Let's do Catch Me If You Can at 9.

Let's do Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade at 8. Hell yeah. Can I get an okay? Okay. What's number seven? Now I don't know where to go. Close Encounters, I think. It's either Close Encounters or Schindler's List,

and it's hard to know where to place Schindler's List on here. Because Schindler's List obviously is a hugely important film, Oscar-winning film, all of that. It's not one we revisit because of its nature. And so for that reason, it then doesn't become something we talk about all the time because we're not rewatching Schindler's List as far as I know. It doesn't have that repeatability that all of the other films that we're going to list here now do. I think that that's correct i think schindler's list is a major achievement and it signals him getting over that hump of adulthood that you cited earlier joanna which i think is is right i think it is no doubt an incredible achievement as a movie it is actually it is

rewatchable in its way because it is such so artfully made in addition to being such a powerful and essential story. But it's just the top six is they are the visions of movie dreams. You know, the top six is they are embedded

in our souls, especially for people that are our age. So I think Schindler's List at seven is good. What is left out of the top five? This is what's remaining.

Saving Private Ryan, Jurassic Park, E.T. the Extraterrestrial, Raiders of the Lost Ark, Close Encounters of the Third Kind, and Jaws. I guess you're going to say Close Encounters here, Jo? It's either Saving Private Ryan or Close Encounters. I agree with Jo. I was going to say the exact same thing. Well, Amanda, which would you put at six?

God, I don't know. Well, what are we trying to do with this list at this point? We're trying to fulfill our government contract. Okay. Well, how much are you doing kind of like cinema history importance? And even there, that's kind of tough because they're both significant

in Spielberg's career in different ways. They're both significant in cinema history in different ways. I feel like significant in cinema history in different ways. I feel like, you know, you guys did Saving Private Ryan on the rewatchables fairly recently, and that was like a fan vote, if I recall. One of the biggest episodes

we've ever done on the show. Yeah. So that had a real mainstream, like ongoing mainstream moment, I think. People still love it to this day, no question. Yeah. In a way that Close Encounters is just older. It is older.

The iconography of Close Encounters, the way it is such a personal movie for him, especially on this like Fableman's podcast. Yeah, but we have more of those. And even on the, we have another movie that scratches a lot of the itch of Close Encounters. That's fair. Still close encounters that's fair still left that's fair and so close encounters and then saving private ryan yeah and saving private ryan is five i'll just say if it were me personally i would put et at six fuck off like honestly

i think et should be four fuck off again what's wrong with both of you um it's not getting higher than four minute there's absolutely no way there's no no Four, fuck off again. What's wrong with both of you? It's not getting higher than four, Amanda. There's absolutely no way. Are you serious? There's no way in hell. You have no heart. Four is a really high placement on a list of- Are you kidding?

If you're talking about iconography, Jesus Christ, it's E.T. It is the project and the fulfillment of the project and it's weird and it's moving and he just wants to bike with his friends and i'll be right here like god damn it it should at least be three i think it's i think it should be higher but fine that tantrum makes me want to put it at six what would you put it for what would if it were three what would you put is for amanda i'm looking it's raiders jaws and i understand that but i and i and i love jurassic park so much so i feel like i'm kind of fighting against history here a little bit fine it can be four but i'm not happy this is tough right because if we do if we go raiders, Jurassic Park, and Jaws, which I think,

and then you can flip-flop Raiders and Jurassic Park if you wanted to, and I think we can safely agree that Jaws is number one for a variety of reasons. Is that, to Amanda's point, which was rudely shared but is fair, are we overlooking one half of the Spielberg project? The emotionality, the family story, the idea of the broken home and using that as a portal to better understanding ourselves. You know, E.T. does that. I would argue Close Encounters does it in a more interesting way, but it's okay to be overruled on that one. I think Jurassic Park does that. It does.

You've got kids of divorce in Jurassic Park, and you've got a reluctant father figure in Dr. Alan Grant, which is the, you know, and then you've got that awe and wonder, the Spielberg face, the looking up at something that is dazzling you in Jurassic Park inside a technological achievement, a perfect horror film, an action-adventure romp. Like, Jurassic Park's my number one, but I'm happy to put Jaws at number one, but I think that- It's my number one as well, but I think, you know, we'll get- I'm still very angry about E.T., so Jaws can be number one.

Well, I just don't know why you guys have to be so disrespectful when you're talking about it, you know? It's number four. It's a wonderful movie. It would be number six to me. I don't really care about it, and I's like before it's a wonderful movie number six to me i don't really care about it and i think close encounters is better i don't care about it i care about it i just think it's not it's actually just from a purely technical perspective not aging as well as these other movies i mean jaws looks better than et does and it was made 10 years before it doesn't can i tell you a tremendous quote from Spielberg on E.T.?

He said, how do you fill the heart of a lonely child? I was like, oh my God. I'd still put it at number four. You're both brainiacs, so I think you'll probably appreciate this. You know when you took a test in school and you studied really hard for the test and there was an extra credit question on the test

and you were prepared for it and you got it right and you got the paper back and it was like, you got a 107 on this test. And you were like, I'm probably the smartest person who's ever lived. That must be like what Steven Spielberg felt like when he finished Jurassic Park, where he was like, this was really hard. I worked really hard on it and I changed everything forever because I'm so good. Not only that, but he made it the same year he made Schindler's List. I know.

And then he won the Oscar. What a lord. He's got actually, he might be the king of the multi-release year. I was thinking about this. You know, West Side Story and The Fableman's come out basically within a 12-month window of each other, which I find fascinating. That's not exactly what I'm talking about. But 2011 was an ignominious version of this in which he released Tintin and War Horse. But 2002 is remarkable.

Minority reporting, catch me if you can, would be the single best year for any filmmaker that isn't Steven Spielberg, basically of all time. 93, as you said, Joanna, Jurassic Park, and Schindler's List. 97, The Lost World, Jurassic Park, and Amistad. 1989, Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade, and always... Steven Spielberg cannot not be working. He gets really stressed out if he's not working because I think it's that control thing, Amanda. in the last crusade and always Steven Spielberg cannot not be working like he gets really stressed out if he's not working

because I think it's that control thing Amanda yes he finds peace and yeah knows which way is up as long as he's in charge of it I get it

I don't have control here and I'm very upset so four is a position of honor for a beautiful film are you doing a are you doing like a

I'm doing a bit to make the podcast more fun thing, are you doing like a, I'm doing a bit to make the podcast more fun thing or are you actually like, are you mad? Are you going to send Joe a nasty slack after this? I would never send

Joe a nasty slack. I might be rude to you for a few days, but like, that's par for the course. What did we decide? Are we comfortable with the idea of

Jurassic Park at two and Raiders at three? You guys would put Jurassic Park at one if all things were being equal here. But they're not because I'm going to

bully you both. Needed at two. Yes. Even though I understand that Raiders like changed movies or whatever. But then Jurassic Park

changed them again. So Raiders, Jurassic Park, Jaws. Anything you want to redo here before I read this list? I mean I feel like this is a very good

list with also some flaws in it. All right. Why don't you get your complaints out now so that you don't try to like sell us out later. This is a group exercise. Maybe it's not. Maybe it's perfect.

Okay. I'm going to read it and tell me how it sounds to you, okay? I'm going to read 35 consecutive film titles in a row. This is my dream. This is what I think all podcasting should be. It's just me saying movie titles. Number 35, The BFG.

Number 34, Ready Player One. Number 33, War Horse. 32, Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull. 31, 1941. Number 30 is Always. 29, The Adventures of Tintin. 28, The Terminal. 27, The Post. 26, Duel. 25, Twilight Zone, The Movie. 24, The Lost World, Jurassic Park. 23, The Color Purple. 22, The Sugarland Express. 21, Hook.

20, Bridge of Spies. 19, Amistad. 18, Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom. 17, War of the Worlds. We're here at the halfway mark. 16, West Side Story. 15, Munich. 14, AI.

13, Empire of the Sun. 12, The Fablemans. 11, Lincoln. 10, Minority Report. 9, 13 Empire of the Sun, 12 The Fablemans, 11 Lincoln, 10 Minority Report, 9 Catch Me If You Can, 8 Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade, 7 Schindler's List, 6 Close Encounters of the Third Kind, 5 Saving Private Ryan, 4 E.T. I'm Very Sorry Amanda, 3 Raiders of the Lost Ark, 2 Jurassic Park, and number one, Jaws. Any flaws, any errors, anything we need to redo? In the interest of democracy not dying in the dark,

should the post jump Duel and Twilight Zone, the movie? I would vote yes, but the Twilight Zone is very important to Sean, so. Well, that's not necessarily what I was trying to say with that,

but I hear what you're saying. Should the post hop dual but stay below Twilight Zone the movie I think maybe even the post would hop the Lost World personally

it would for me yeah let's bring it all the way up we'll put the post at 24 and move dual Twilight Zone and Lost World back

yeah okay I think that's reasonable I'm a fan of the post. I've talked about the post a couple of times recently. Yeah. That was the only one

that stood out to me. I was like, I'm happy to be harsh on the post, but not that harsh on the post. So, yeah, the only thing that bothers me is Last Crusade, but that was a hard negotiation

and I'm okay with where we landed. I mean, I definitely would not take Last Crusade over Catch Me If You Can or Minority Report. So I felt like I gave. I know. It was a bargain.

Okay. It was a bargain. Is The Fablemans too high at 12? Conversely, will this turn out to be a top 10 Spielberg movie when all is said and done? I feel like it's higher than Munich and West Side Story, two other Kushner collaborations, and rightfully so, even though I really liked West Side Story. But some of that is just like they were remaking, you know, something many times over, and I thought they remade it beautifully. But that's kind of middle of the road. So I'm okay with it being above Munich, and it's right below Lincoln, which I think is correct, even though I think Joe kind of quietly said that Lincoln is a little boring, and I agree.

But it's, you know, important. Joanna, are you okay with this? Yes. Here's what I think is really interesting and what feels really true to me. Everything in the top 10 is 20 years old or older. I believe we discussed this when we talked about West Side Story as well. But you know what? That's normal. For most filmmakers, that first 30 years is the heyday. That is the vitality period. He started very young.

He got a lot of stuff across the line, but before he was 60 years old, he's still making great movies. That's the difference is that most of his contemporaries, barring maybe Martin Scorsese, are not as productive and not as successful in their work as he has been. Steven Spielberg.

Frigid Spies would have been a lot higher if it were just me and Sean Joe. It would definitely be over Temple of Doom, for Christ's sake. You can put Bridge... You can hop Amistad and Temple of Doom if you want to put Bridge of Spies higher below War of the Worlds. Yeah, I think I need that.

I would like to do that. Yeah, that's great. I think I need Bridge of Spies at 18 and we move Amistad to 20 and Temple of Doom to 19. There are Temple of Doom to 19. There are, there are Temple of Doom truthers, but I think it's got a lot of flaws.

It's got some problems, bad vibes, bad vibes. But listen, he made, he met the love of his life. He kept on that movie. So he met the great Kate Capshaw.

It's just, it's, it's one of his only mean spirited movies. Yeah. So it just doesn't, it doesn't hang right on him. This was great. I feel like we, feel like we fulfilled our duties

and now the Biden administration can go forward with the official Spielberg rankings. That's great. It's fantastic. I'm really proud of everything we've done here. This is a great place to wrap up. Thank you so much, Joanna. Listen to Joanna on The Ringerverse,

the Prestige TV podcast, Trial by Content. Where else are you selling your wares at this point? That's all the places you can find me peddling my opinions. Okay. Amanda will be back with me on this show after the holidays. We're going to be talking about all the movies from this year that we missed and a whole trundle of November releases. Dear Lord, they're releasing all these movies right now.

Where were these movies in August? I don't really know. Thanks so much to Kai Grady for filling in for Bobby Wagner today. Shout out to Kai as he listened to us prattle on about the 19th best Steven Spielberg movie. And thanks for listening to The Big Picture. Have a wonderful Thanksgiving holiday. We'll see you next week. Thank you.